Twelve Days The Beginning - By Jade Reyner Page 0,64

always been a joker and a flirt around her; this was a side of him she had never seen before. The coldness in his eyes was almost scary.

“I – do – not – talk – about – Natalie – EVER!” he hissed, his voice low to prevent Olivia from overhearing. “Understand?”

Shocked at his outburst, Elise mumbled an apology and turned back to her own work. Jesus Christ! Definitely not a subject up for discussion with him either. Who was this woman and why did she invoke such emotion in both Stephen and Vaughn?

A few minutes later, just as she had managed to lose herself in a particularly boring spreadsheet, her e-mail pinged and she was surprised to see that it was from Stephen.

Mon Dec 17th. 9.15am

Elise,

Sorry for my outburst – it’s not your fault. Just do me a favour, don’t mention her again.

Your question proves one thing though – you were definitely with a certain boss of ours on Saturday night!!

Gotcha there babe! Soooooo busted!

Elise read and then re-read the e-mail. Shit! She had completely given herself away without thinking. She wasn’t particularly concerned about Stephen - he had the morals of an alley cat - but she didn’t want it to be general knowledge that she had spent time alone with Vaughn. Jesus! Why didn’t she ever learn to think before she spoke?

Before she could formulate a reply her computer pinged again.

Mon Dec 17th. 9.20am

Don’t worry babe, your secret’s safe with me.

I promise.

Stephen x x

She looked across at him and he winked – and just like that, the tension was gone and they were back to their usual relationship. She smiled at him and mouthed ‘thank you’ then carried on with her work, keen to put in a full day after the debacle of Friday.

By lunchtime she had finished everything left over from Friday plus most of Monday’s work so she was feeling good and ready for her catch up with Cole. Oddly, he had not e-mailed her, which she found strange and come to think of it, she’d not heard from Vaughn either. Whilst she hadn’t necessarily expected to after how they’d left things on Sunday morning, she couldn’t help being a little disappointed.

Packing up her desk, she decided to head to Cole’s office again and see if she could catch him and entice him out to lunch. When she got there she was surprised to see that his office was still empty although his jacket and briefcase were there so she knew he must be around somewhere.

“Has anyone seen Mr Andrews today?” she asked in the general direction of the outer office. “Er.. I think he’s with Mr Granger – he mentioned he had a meeting with him.” replied Roger, one of the new junior’s assigned to Cole’s tutelage.

“Oh ok...thanks Roger” she said.

She hesitated for a moment trying to decide what to do. The fact that Cole had not e-mailed her slightly worried her and she wondered if he had been in a meeting with Vaughn all morning. That would explain the radio silence from both of them but if it was something important then she didn’t want to interrupt.

She supposed she could just walk round to Vaughn’s office and look through the window and see whether or not they looked like they were about to finish up. She really did want to talk to Cole and didn’t think she could wait another day.

Rounding the corner to the kitchen, she was surprised to see the door of Vaughn’s office open and the room empty of all furniture. As she got closer she saw that the nameplate had also been removed and frowned at it in confusion. Obviously Vaughn was no longer occupying this office but she had no idea where he could be and why - after only a couple of days – why had he arranged to move elsewhere?

Deciding to ask Stephen as she felt sure that he would know the answer, Elise walked back to her desk. He was on the phone so she sat and waited patiently until he had finished.

“Hey,” he said after hanging up “I thought you’d gone to lunch.”

“Yeah, I did,” she said, “but I was hoping to catch Cole and he’s not in his office. Apparently he’s with Vaughn but he doesn’t appear to live in his office anymore, I wondered if you had any idea what was going on?”

“Oh right, yeah” replied Stephen “Vaughn moved upstairs this morning – something about more privacy – you’ll find him in one